lhgreengrd1

Hurricane Odile made landfall in the Cabo Corridor as a Category 3 storm last night. It's the strongest Hurricane ever to make landfall in Baja, and it basically made a direct hit on the center of the resort area, but I can't find any damage reports yet - which leads me to believe that communication infrastructure in the area must be pretty severely impacted.

david55

The TripAdvisor Mexico Cabo forum has tons of real time posts and damage reports.

Sounds like a lot of damage. Some of the images of the airport are pretty grim.

jfinsocal

The pictures that I have seen are saddening; that airport looks like a total loss. I feel sorry for locals and tourists in the area.

There's been somewhat of a media vacuum on the hurricane damage and I'm not sure why. TripAdvisor seems to be the most active forum but it's full of yahoos asking if they should go down there next week for their wedding and the like. Seriously?

I suspect that much of that town will not be rebuilt in its current form. It may come back better than before but it will take several years and the short to mid-term economic damage will be severe.

Timeshare owners, many who got suckered into their purchases in the first place, will get hit by assessments and would be smart to walk away if possible.....

Many businesses are already marginal at best and will fail.....

Employees might find work in the construction industry but for those dependent on tourism?????

Hope for the best but it's not a pretty future down there. Hope I'm wrong.

Boraxo

I would not characterize the airport as a "total loss" because it plans to reopen Wed according to our latest TV news report. This means the runways are relatively undamaged and they can board from the tarmac (as has been the case anyway with all my flights). Obviously the terminals are a mess but it isn't clear how much water damage occurred and the debris in the lobby could easily be cleaned out in a few days.

The hotel situation varies depending on the resort - many have info posted on their websites though it will take a few days to assess the full extent of damage and to communicate out. Electricity has been cut by the authorities (for safety reasons) but some resorts have generators. The Villa properties are reporting minimal damage but Riu reports heavy damage. Photos show a couple of properties that are completely flooded on the ground floor and others with windows blown out from most of the rooms.

From what I've seen the damage looks similar to what we saw for Cancun after Wilma 2005. That took weeks to clean up completely and the airport was closed for at least two weeks.

I suspect the town will be cleaned up and fully open for business by Xmas if not Thanksgiving. But some hotels will need a lot more time than that.

david55

It may be also be like the hurricane that stuck PV years ago. Most hotels recovered....some left as derelict shells never to rebuild.

I read the airport will re-open on September 22.

lhgreengrd1

From what I can tell, the communications infrastructure is pretty trashed - and the only info getting out is via very sporadic internet.

One of the most useful articles I've found:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...ane-Odile.html

tangey

Sheraton and Westin are both closed for business until at least 31st October.

icydog

The Hilton the the RIU where very severely damaged as well.

Look at my thread about my friends predicament in Cabo

UA suggested a new itinerary leaving on Saturday, flying nonstop to EWR, instead of the stopover planned in IAH.

Since I cannot get through to them I made the decision without their input. I hope I did the right thing!

jfinsocal

I have friends there too and am trying to help them get home. There is no reliable information in Todos Santos or here for that matter.

Los Cabos is a very remote place in a desert and the local resources would not normally support anything near its population. This is unique to Cabo and they do not need tourists coming down in the foreseeable future to stress their infrastructure. What resources they have now and in the next few months now should be used to support the locals.

The problem that I foresee is business owners declaring themselves "open for business" when foreigners have no business being there. I hope that tourists stay away until the place is semi-functional and based on prior major hurricanes in more accessible areas of Mexico this will take 2-3 months at best. I have little faith that the Mexican government is willing to make this decision unfortunately.

Best wishes to the locals and tourists and please provide any info about ferry flights to the US or Mexico.

corky

The one and only Palmilla is closed indefinitely.
So sad for everyone down there. Tourism is such a huge part of their economy. This will hurt a lot of people.

SanDiego1K

Alaska Airlines has a blog about their efforts to bring planes in and out.

http://blog.alaskaair.com/2014/09/16/hurricane-odile/

And very classy of Alaska: they flew a plane to Mazatlan despite having no scheduled service in order to fly out folks evacuated from Cabo by Mexican military fiights:

http://blog.alaskaair.com/2014/09/17/relief-flights/

jfinsocal

I don't know if FT allows to link to TripAdvisor. There are several report of big trouble tonight in Cabo. Gangs, looting, rioting etc. Search in the Cabo San Lucas threads. There area also Twitter reports.

If you know anybody stuck there I would not leave a hotel property, particularly at night.

Hope for the best.

JDiver

Things are improving very slowly. Mexican Air Force 727s are flying some out to domestic locations, AA has initiated some flights under conditions that only documented US residents and citizens may board these to the USA. Looting and violence have occurred. A UK visitor is missing, another confirmed dead, as well as two South Korean visitors and one German.

Recovery is likely to take some time. My advice would be to stay away for at least a couple of months; hopefully, some normalcy will be restored by the Christmas season.

Mexico has a pretty controlled press, so there's not so much news from that angle, and it's hard to get reporters in when there are scarcities in power, comm, lodging, food, transport, etc. Vigilante groups are attempting to protect neighborhoods from violence and looting even today.

BBC News article "Vigilantes tackle post-storm looting" (21Sep 2014)

Wall Street Journal article (19 Sep 2014)

More recently, Princess Cruises has cancelled visits to the area (24 Sep 2014).

jujubean71

http://www.loscabosguide.com/blog/20...os-businesses/

Here you will find updates about those Los Cabos businesses that have reopened or announced estimated dates for reopening. Do you have information about a particular business? Email us at [email protected] or tweet us at @LosCabosMag.

JDiver

jujubean71, thanks for posting that.

We are all hoping for speedy relief and normalcy for residents and visitors to Baja California Sur.